Discuss the good and bad about the episode. If you totally loved the episode or totally didn't love the episode and do not wish to discuss the pros and cons, please visit the Loved it or Didn't Love it threads.

Jack inadvertently helps turn Ben evil -- in my opinion great concept with lousy execution!

The main reason I feel this way is the comment from Richard "Oh by the way he won't remember this" - sounds like a soap opera style cop-out. It feels weak. I would have more easily accepted Ben's gunshot wound being 'magically cured by the island' (plenty of precedent for that) so we could spend more time listening to the Hurley and Miles conversation.

Speaking of which, that conversation never really took off. The elephant in the room that needs to be dealt with eventually is 1977 - we've been there for a couple of episodes now and no real movement towards resolution. Ben - we get it - he's going to be evil enough with the gunshot and abusive father no need for the cult ritual. However, lots of ways to deal with the time travel story. Sawyer's con could fall apart when someone in the DI notices the Losties saying or doing something unusual (for example, motor pool mechanics and janitors performing surgical procedures). Daniel could move the donkey wheel again and send them out of there. Who knows.

Anyway, if we find out later Ben does remember his shooting and someone like Horace or Dr Candle knows all about the Losties- hats off to the writers and I take the above criticisms back!

Completely agree with OliverAndCo

For once I actually enjoyed a Kate centered story, her new goal to find Claire (who it seemed as if the writers and characters had simply forgotten) gives some purpose to this season.

Well, the first of many. We know Kate's purpose, and having a goal laid out other than simply watching characters skipping through Dharmaville instantly created some excitement. Hurley and Miles had some good conversations, although Hurley's ignorance about simple time travel pissed me off a bit. When they finally addressed 'future' Ben knowing Sayid it got interesting.

But a single comment, made by Richard, holds the episode back from a "love-it". The "he won't remember any of this" was a HORRIBLE cop-out. It was such a simple statement, that ruined any exiciting ideas or theories about Ben's knowledge. I would have liked to see the island miraculously save him, true proof that you cannot change anything. But I'll settle for this. I always thought the knocked out Ben would awake to 'remember' all these occurences in present time beside Locke, as Desmond had when Faraday intervened...so no great loss to my Lost Dreams. Next week looks promising.

Maybe it's less a cop out, and more a forshadowing of the ordeal Ben is about to go through. Trauma can cause people to forget things...and it certainly seems Richard is about to take him though something traumatic, on top of being shot.

Rewatched, and some mentionable moments for me:

1. Struck me how when Sawyer and Kate plus Ben get caught by the Others and Sawyer tells the dude with the gun, 'this could become both our problem' he's even more right than I realized the first time: the kid (Ben) getting shot by Sayid, who would go on to kill the same Other just days later! Sawyer was right; it became a huge problem for that guy. ;)

2. Kate telling Ma Littleton that when Claire disappeared, they ''looked everywhere'' for her. I beg to differ. Things were chaotic and I can't recall anyone actually looking for Claire, apart from Sawyer's initial shouting, and later Hurley's question to Jack, ''when we get back we'll find Claire, right?'' Was she just overwrought? I even question her assertion on Claire being alive, come to that. But our Kate's a complex one, isn't she?

3. In a pretty strong episode with great acting by Evi, the last half a minute still steals the show: hello, Ben. Welcome back to the land of the living. Class, TOQ and ME. And what does that imply in the context of Un Locke?

The Others really don't fair well, do they?

You're right, evanesco, they didn't look anywhere for Claire--at least that we saw--and everyone seemed to conveniently forget about worrying about her. On top of Claire's grief for Charlie going from devastated to "ho-hum, let's do some laundry" it seems really odd. Why bother to even keep Claire around if this is how she's going to be treated by the rest of the characters, you know? At least in early season episodes when we didn't see her and people didn't mention her, we knew it was because she was back chilling at the beach taking care of Aaron and there wasn't anything to mention.

Interesting thoughts about "UnLocke." It seems to imply he's alive. And is the "welcome back" a clue that Ben's status of dead/alive changed?

Hey, Dev!

That's exactly what I thought about unLocke too, wrt Ben.

I agree completely about Claire; she's been pretty neglected of late, and I can't wait to see how they increase her relevance in S6. I'm thinking her Shephard connection (Christian, Jack, Aaron) will be the crux. I still wish we'd seen more grief over Charlie from her, but I guess S4 was chaotic, what with the strike and all.

I agree, her Shephard connection seems very key! I also think it might be significant that she also had visions (albeit in her dreams) on the Island.